How Finding Blue Whale Poop Changed My Life

There are not many people who can say their career started with a pile of poop, but that is just what happened with marine biologist and 2016 National Geographic Emerging Explorer Asha De Vos. Fresh out of undergrad, De Vos managed to talk her way onto a whale research vessel headed for her home country of Sri Lanka. The vessel came across some blue whales ... and an unexpected scene. A captivating story teller, De Vos takes the stage to share her passion for whales and the work she is doing to protect a population of "unorthodox whales" off the coast of her homeland.

The National Geographic Live series brings thought-provoking presentations by today’s leading explorers, scientists, photographers, and performing artists right to you. Each presentation is filmed in front of a live audience at National Geographic headquarters in Washington, D.C.

I was seeing six blue whales in an area the size of a soccer pitch. Each animal is the length of a soccer pitch. I have gone on to name them the “unorthodox whales” because they actually break the stereotypes we had for this species. It has sent me on an incredible adventure.

It was back in 2003. I was working on a whale research vessel that was circumnavigating the globe. On this particular day of significance, I was standing up on deck, straining my eyes, looking out for this pod of sperm whales that we'd tracked all night long. I could hear their sounds emanating from the pilot house below me, but I just couldn't see them. I knew what I was looking for, this short lofty blow slanted off to the left hand side, super characteristic of sperm whale. I searched and I looked for hours on end and I couldn't find them. But then I saw this, a tall, powerful, vertical blow that rose all the way to the sky as far as I could tell. This animal was at least two kilometers away from us, but it was an incredible sight, and I knew it could only come from an animal that was incredibly large and powerful. So I got super excited, as you would as well, and I grabbed my walkie-talkie and I called down to my captain. I said, "Bob, Bob, 11 o'clock, two kilometers, go go go," and he says, "Why?" And I said, "I think it's a blue whale," and he says, "Sure." Get's off course, starts cruising the direction that I've now sent him off in, and I am now, like so afraid and paranoid to lose this visual. My eyes are streaming as I stare into the glare. I'm trying so hard to just focus, and that's when I think I've started to lose my mind. Because it wasn't just one blue whale I was seeing. I was seeing six blue whales in an area the size of a soccer pitch. Each animal is the length of a soccer pitch. So to me, it made absolutely no sense. I'm thinking to myself, why on earth would an animal, the largest that has ever roamed the planet, with the freedom to travel 70% of our planet, choose to just aggregate in this tiny little spot in a warm tropical ocean?

So, I was fresh out of undergrad, and I started to think about what I'd been taught. Thought about my textbooks and what my professors had said, and I remembered, large whales like blue whales undertake long-range migrations between cold feeding areas and warm breeding and calving areas. That was it. I was super stoked. I was going to be the first person on the planet to document blue whales having sex. So I, you know, I thought, this is awesome, my career is made, fame and fortune. What do people complain about, this is so easy, gosh. So I'm there egging the captain on. I'm like, "Bob, we have to go. "This is going to be incredible!" So, we're moving forward, getting there, we're moving as fast as this boat can take us, and we get there, and it is not what you think it is. There's not a single whale penis in sight. I am super disappointed, because these whales are now lolling at the surface, hanging out, occasionally one will dive, come back up, and I'm like, what the heck is going on? My dreams that I had created for the last two kilometers of my life were completely shattered. And I was like, oh my god, what am I going to do with my life? But I insisted that we stayed around and watched for a little, 'cause, you know, this was my first blue whale, or six.

And that's when I saw this. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a pile of blue whale poop. What's most exciting about this is not just the stunning red color, but the fact that there was poo, which meant these animals were feeding somewhere close. Now remember what I told you at the start. Blue whales undertake long range migrations between cold feeding areas and warm breeding and calving areas. Sri Lanka is five degrees above the equator, as warm and as tropical as it can get. What the heck? How the hell were they feeding in these waters? They're considered unproductive because they're warm. This was my eureka moment. Not everyone can say that their careers started with a pile of (bleep), But I'm pretty pleased to be able to do that. The thing is, this moment spiraled into me pioneering blue whale research in the Northern Indian Ocean. I launched the first long term study on this population of pretty much unknown blue whales. Crazy but true, and it has set me on an incredible adventure. In the intervening years I have discovered that in fact, these waters, because of the enclosed nature of the Northern Indian Ocean, the situation of Sri Lanka's southern coast is extremely productive for that latitude.

I've gone on to name them the “unorthodox whales”, because they actually break the stereotypes we had for this species. They don't undertake long range migrations, they actually have a very limited range. They hang out all year round in warm tropical waters of the Northern Indian Ocean. They're the smallest of the blue whales that you'll find in the oceans. They're called pygmy blue whales. They grow to 80 feet, not 100. They have a different acoustic dialect. They also have different behaviors. They lift their tail flukes up before a deep dive more often than anywhere else in the world, so you'll see this about 60% of the time, whereas anywhere else, less than 20% of the time. It's a photographer's dream destination. Blue whales everywhere in the world are called stenophagous, because they're very specific, they feed on one single thing, krill. These guys feed on shrimp, a little different. But the key thing here is that they have all these different behaviors and adaptations, because they are living in a very confined space over a very limited range. And during the course of my work, I've also met the oldest blue whale in our population. I took this photograph in 2011 on a documentary shoot, and as soon as I saw the markings, I thought to myself, I have seen you before. Luckily, not a lot of work had gone on before on these whales. In fact, there was only one paper that existed in the history of our nation, and that was done in 1984, and you can see, and I've named it Whalentine. But the point is, this animal is at least 27 years old and it's living in our waters, but what's really cool about this sighting is that you can see, where I saw the whale in 2011 was just less than 10 kilometers away from where it was sighted in 1984. So, we're getting a sense of sight fidelity, how important this area is to these animals. We know they're feeding, breeding, and calving in a very confined space, so the conservation problems they face are far more compounded.

Right now my crusade is about saving these whales from getting killed by ships. The southern coast of Sri Lanka is one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. It's the main artery through the Indian Ocean. Everything from Singapore to Dubai cruises right through these waters. Here's some of the data we have. The red lines are showing you this dense ship traffic. The black dots, those are whale sightings. Look at the south coast. There's a distinct overlap. So sightings like this, are totally unsurprising. This is a whale that came wrapped on the bow of a container ship into the main port in Sri Lanka, in Colombo, in 2012. 12 days later we had another carcass floating at sea with a massive propeller gash. The thing is, evidence like this can be a little bit rare, because oftentimes the carcasses will sink, get pushed off shore, or they'll deteriorate so much that when they come on to shore, we can't actually identify the cause of death. But calculations show that for every one we document, at least ten have gone undocumented. So it's not an isolated incident. Neither are the numbers small. 90% of the vessels that cruise through our waters are actually bypassing my country, they're not coming into port. So if we can shift the shipping lanes 15 nautical miles off shore, we can reduce the problem significantly. And then that 10 percent of vessels that are actually coming into port, well if they slowed down a little it would make a difference. I've done the science, I've created all the awareness, and now I'm pushing for policy change, both at the level of Sri Lankan government, but also intergovernmentally, because shipping lanes are a slightly complex problem. But my work is not just about saving whales. My work is about showing the talent of the developing world. I believe that we get local scientists trained so they can start looking after their own waters using local solutions, that is what creates sustainability. And I invite all of you to join me on this audacious, audacious journey, to achieve this for the sake of the oceans and humanity. Thank you.

How Finding Blue Whale Poop Changed My Life

There are not many people who can say their career started with a pile of poop, but that is just what happened with marine biologist and 2016 National Geographic Emerging Explorer Asha De Vos. Fresh out of undergrad, De Vos managed to talk her way onto a whale research vessel headed for her home country of Sri Lanka. The vessel came across some blue whales ... and an unexpected scene. A captivating story teller, De Vos takes the stage to share her passion for whales and the work she is doing to protect a population of "unorthodox whales" off the coast of her homeland.

The National Geographic Live series brings thought-provoking presentations by today’s leading explorers, scientists, photographers, and performing artists right to you. Each presentation is filmed in front of a live audience at National Geographic headquarters in Washington, D.C.